A Smattering of Stories
by Bee.Eh.Vee
Summary: An attempt to fulfill each of the prompts from NCISLAMagazine's Character Appreciation Weeks. #GrangerAppreciationWeek #EricAppreciationWeek #NellAppreciationWeek
1. Granger

**A Smattering of Stories**

**Disclaimer:** Don't own the characters or the show.

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**Granger  
**_Prompt: 'Granger and his mysterious hobby'_

"Mithtah Gee, I need help."

Granger dug into his shirt pocket for a pin. "Is it falling down again?"

"Yeth." She tugged her pants up.

"Hold still." He clenched a second safety pin between his teeth as he gathered up a chunk of the waistband. The pin was stabbed through the fabric and he placed the second one further down just in case. "There, Lucy, it should stay up now."

"Thankth!" Lucy skipped away, testing the ability of his fix.

A crack sounded and he spun toward the sound, and sighed. He moved towards it, but first he had to wade through a group of kids sword-fighting. He winced as two of the swords collided with a hard smack. "Save it for later, guys." Some grumbling met his statement, but they stopped. He reached his destination and jumped in to steady a ladder. "Helen, why are you up there?"

She peered down from her perch. "One of the vines came loose. I'm trying to tack it back into place."

"I don't think you're going to reach it." He eyed the distance between her hand and the offending piece of twine with leaves taped to it.

Helen huffed. "It's the only place to stick the ladder against."

"Come down, I'll reach it." Granger waved her down. She scurried to the floor and he took her place at the top. The staples had let go so he used the string Helen passed up to secure it back on. He climbed back down at watched the final bit of chaos in front of them.

"Lucy's pants kept falling down." Helen went to move towards the little girl, but Granger stopped her.

"I put two pins in the waistband, they should stay."

She sighed. "We have a girl playing Michael, who would've guessed that an orphanage would have no boys under the age of 6?"

"One of the Lost Boys is a girl." Granger nodded towards the spunky blond climbing on the clothes rack.

Helen pressed a hand to her forehead. "I was going to give her Tinkerbell, but I can't have a Tink who can out-belch the boys." She started to move towards the mob of children again, but this time a mocha hand on her arm stopped her.

"Senora Helen, we have it under control." A smile softened her statement. The lithe girl waded through the kids and with a few quiet words the noise lessened.

"I don't know what I would do without her." Helen rolled her eyes. "Ana-Maria seems to have endless patience."

Granger decided it was a good time to ask. "How many kids are you up to?"

"Twenty-eight, and we have room for two more." She frowned and pointed out two kids, one dressed as a pirate and the other in pajamas. "However their mother almost has her work permit straightened out. You'll remember she was the one whose employer got her deported when she couldn't get his wine stain out of his shirt."

Of course Granger remembered him; he also knew the man wouldn't fight the reinstatement of her permit because he was in the middle of an investigation by the IRS who may have been tipped off.

He looked around the orderly group Ana-Maria had created. They were all legal citizens of the US having been born here to parents legally in the country, but they had no guardians as their parents had all been deported. Some had family but were unable to take care of the extra people. Helen ran the orphanage in conjunction with a legal service that helped the parents through the system. Most of her cases had simple fixes, but thanks to the overloading of the courts, sometimes even the simplest of fixes took months. Granger had stumbled across her when she was arguing with a bailiff about letting a mother hug her daughter after a postponement meant they wouldn't see each other again for another two months. He tried to stop in and help when he was in the area.

Helen threw up her hands. "The doors are opening in minutes! Owen, can you collect tickets?" She shoved a clean coffee can in his hands. "And smile, we're trying to get people in the door, not scare them off."

He grimaced, but took the can and wove his way out of backstage and up the aisle to the back of the community theatre. He checked his watch and waited for the right time. Normally when he dropped in, helping meant fixing a leaky faucet or moving a piece of donated furniture into the right room. This time, however, it meant collecting tickets for their fundraising production of 'Peter Pan'.

He checked the time again and opened the door. He stood to the side and collected the tickets. There were people who were family carrying video cameras, prepared to record the play for when the parents returned. Other people were supporters of the cause, either with money or by volunteering. He saw some lawyerly types that Helen had recruited and then guilt-tripped into showing up.

As he was pulling the door shut for the play to begin one more man ran up the stairs. "Owen Granger, Helen got you in her clutches too?"

Granger gave him a lopsided grin. "DA Clarke, I'm surprised to see you here."

Clarke shook his head. "I can't fight cases for her, but she does come to me for advice now and again." He peered into the crowd. "Ah, there's my wife. I'll see you after the show." He hurried down the aisle and squeezed into his seat.

Granger followed his example, moving down the side aisle and slipped back behind the stage. The next hour was spent moving scenery, fixing costumes, whispering forgotten lines, and keeping the kids that were offstage quiet, which was difficult considering how much sugar they'd been eating all day. When it was all over the roar from the crowd put massive smiles on everyone's faces. Helen shouted a thank you to all the guests and waved them towards refreshments in the lobby.

"Mithtah Gee, Mithtah Gee!" Lucy barreled into one of his legs. "What did you think?"

He swung her up in the air. "I think you did great!"

She laughed as he put her back on the ground. "Could you tell I'm mithing two teeth?" Her tongue poked out of the hole formed by the lost teeth.

"Not at all." He shook his head.

"Good, becauthe I practithed." She proclaimed. She then ran off to join the rest of the kids heading for the sweets table.

Ana-Marie sighed as she watched them tear up the aisle. "They are not going to sleep any time soon tonight" she said with her soft accent.

Granger smiled, "They'll crash in a pile tonight and sleep in tomorrow morning.

"You have not dealt with children very often, if you think that is true."

The smile changed into a smirk, "No, maybe not children, but definitely childish behaviour."

She waved forward, "Come, we must say hello to the guests," a pause during which she grinned, "and get some sweets of our own."

Granger followed her to the lobby where the party was in full swing. The energy was high and both kids and adults were enjoying themselves. He worked the room, saying hello and talking to people he knew while introducing himself to new people. Helen wrangled a promise out of him to come down to their building and fix some loose door handles and sticking windows. She promised she would get him help and he watched as her next stop was Clarke. Granger guessed that this time Clarke wasn't being sought for his legal expertise, instead Helen would fill his hand with a screwdriver.

The night was long but he headed home after numerous hugs and a kiss from Lucy. With all the ugliness he saw in his job, he cherished the innocence of the kids and looked forward to trying to fix door knobs with three heads pushed in front of him so they could see what he was doing.


	2. Eric

**A Smattering of Stories**

**Disclaimer:** Don't own the characters or the show.  
**A/N: **Thanks to blue dogs rock, Susan L. Grabon, ncisnewbie, ToOldToShip, Guest M, and I Feel Possessed for dropping comments on the last chapter.

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**Eric  
**_Prompt: 'Eric and why/how he got banned from Vegas'_

He waggled his wrist and found himself reminded, again, that he may have gone too far this time. He frowned and slouched in his chair.

"It appears you have gotten yourself into a bit of a situation."

His head snapped up in surprise, he hadn't heard anyone come in. The diminutive lady looked nothing like the parade of visitors he had thus far. She obviously took his silence as a signal to continue.

"I'm told your name is Tom Cochrane."

He nodded, not sure what words to form.

"As in Tom Cochrane, of the band Red Rider and also a solo artist, with several hits to his name including 'Life is a Highway'." She said it as a statement, but her raised brows demanded a response.

"Uh huh" was all he could manage.

"The LVPD have yet to find out that you have created a rather elaborate alias to hide your true identity. Isn't that right?"

He felt as though she had just ratcheted the heat up. He shrank back to nodding as an answer.

"My name is Henrietta Lange, and it's my real one. What is yours?"

"Eric Beale" He swallowed as his eyes darted around to the cameras.

She smiled, as if he'd passed her test. "I work for NCIS, which is the Naval Criminal Investigative Service and I have a proposal for you."

* * *

_Earlier_

Eric looked around at the suite. He had it to himself since his buddies had gone off to count cards at a casino down the strip. They were smart enough to not do it in the place they were staying, but Eric could guarantee that they weren't smart enough to not get caught. He had worked both sides of the blackjack table, once designing security systems for casino games and then playing professionally, but then it had become too mundane.

So he'd turned his attention to a more interesting pursuit: hacking.

He let his friends drag him to Vegas, but they had made the mistake of not forcing him to leave his computer at home. The laptop came out of his bag and he flexed his fingers.

"Let's see what we can do about that room bill."

He spent a few hours poking around the firewall of the hotel and casino complex's system, looking for a sweet little entry point. He found one and snuck right in. Once he was hooked into their system, he went for a little sight-seeing tour through their programs. He watched some security footage of people down on the casino floor, rooted through the alerts for suspected cheaters (he was happy to not see his face on that list), and took care of his bill.

The security measures around the more interesting sections were tighter and it took some time to wiggle his way through them. Stealing money held no interest for him, even though it would have been easy to siphon some of it off of the many transactions occurring every minute. Two cents here, a half a penny there; it would only take him an hour to become a millionaire. But then he risked someone noticing the theft and he would have to worry about an investigation. That was something he didn't want to deal with, he'd worked hard to stay under the radar.

He easily amused himself scrolling through the background checks of the employees, making mental notes of how detailed the searches were. If he understood what the investigators were looking for he could make his own aliases tighter and more impervious to being exposed. No one had even noticed he'd made his way into the system yet and that made him feel comfortable enough to go a bit deeper.

As he wormed his way back over to the section that controlled the money, something else was happening. A few lines of code caught his eye and he honed in to take a better look.

"You have got to be kidding me." Eric was astonished. Someone was hacking their way into accounts. It was nothing like his hack which was elegant and stealthy. This one was noisy and clumsy; it was akin to an elephant stomping through underbrush. Eric could almost feel the tremors through his keyboard. He slipped in behind the hack and watched as it began to take money out of all the open accounts, but not small amounts that would go unnoticed, instead large amounts were leaving all in one shot.

Eric was insulted by the heist. He couldn't decide if he was more offended by the heavy-handedness of the hack, the fact that the thief didn't seem to care that there was no way nobody would notice the missing money, or that the hotel he was currently staying in was in the midst of being robbed. There was a protective feeling that bloomed inside his chest and he could not sit back any longer. It would take some time for the in-house security to notice what was happening and the thief could be mopping up and out by that time, but Eric was already there and he was going to take action.

It was like a predator rising from the mist. He started to hammer away at his keyboard, stealing the money while it was being transited away from the accounts and putting it back. He threw up blocks in front of the accounts one at a time and then went on the offensive. A sniffer was sent out to find the IP address of the hacker and he started to take back ground from the other guy and tried to press him into a corner.

His sniffer came back faster than he expected. "What?" his fingers paused as he processed the information. "It's an inside job?" He shook his head and charged back in. The hacker had gained ground but Eric was relentless in grabbing it back. Once he was satisfied that his work would hold up for a few minutes, he split his screen to let him scroll through those background checks. He was narrowing in on who was at the other end when his door was thrown open and men with guns swarmed in.

They yelled at him to back away from his computer but they ignored him when he shouted that he had almost caught the thief. They didn't listen when he pleaded for them to let him finish and to be careful with his computer. He was hauled down to the closest police station where they dropped him in an interrogation room.

Every person who walked in proved to be the same. He would plead his innocence and try to explain what he was doing, but they wouldn't acknowledge him. They just kept talking about how he wasn't very smart, trying to steal from the very same hotel he was staying in and how it was good that the casino's security caught him. His attempts to explain that it was the other way around, that it was an inside job was met with scoffs. So when this Henrietta Lange walked in and said she had a proposal, he was cautiously interested.

"What kind of proposal?" He asked, finally getting his tongue to function again.

"I know it was you who stalled the robbery, not the other way around. One of my people is explaining that to the LVPD as we speak. I propose that you put your skills to good use."

"What skills?" Eric wasn't quite ready to spill all his secrets.

"The skills that allowed you to sneak into the computer system and run amok through it for approximately 12 hours." She raised her brows at Eric as he blinked and his mouth dropped open slightly. "Yes, you were in there for half a day and nobody noticed," She paused, "until you decided to stop a thief in his tracks."

He swallowed, it appeared she already knew his secrets. "How…how do you know that?"

She gave a small smile that seemed to be heavy in meaning. "I like to keep an eye out for promising talent." She gave a slight nod of her head towards him. "I'm looking for a technical operator and intelligence analyst."

Eric gave her a blank look; he felt like he was missing something and honestly he was confused by the whole situation. Was he really getting a job offer while handcuffed in a police station?

"I need someone to coordinate the technical aspects of my special operations field team of agents. You would be helping to stop terrorism and crime at a digital level."

"You want to give me a license to hack?" Eric felt like he was finally getting a handle on what was going on.

She looked at him over her glasses. "Within reason." She shifted in her chair. "I have seen others who can 'hack'" she pulled her fingers around the word "like you, but unlike them you show a moral side which is probably why this is the first time you've landed in a room like this. That is who I am looking for, someone who wants to save the world, not watch it burn from the safety of a desk chair."

He felt a grin starting, this was the challenge he didn't realize he had been waiting for. "Yes, I would like that."

She gave him another smile. "Good, I need to go talk to some people." She left the room on quiet feet.

Eric slouched back in his seat and waited. However now, it didn't feel as hopeless or lonely. He caught himself tapping his foot and almost started humming. An unknown amount of time passed but the door opened once again.

She walked in first followed by someone who was clearly high in the ranks. Eric sat up straight and tried to ignore the bead of sweat that appeared on his forehead.

"Captain Iverson agrees that you are, in fact, innocent." She stated and then turned towards the man shuffling his feet.

"It appears that we've arrested the wrong man." He coughed. "As such, you are free to go." He slid his eyes to the small woman beside him. "However, there is still the matter of you invading the security system in the first place. In exchange for not pressing charges, we ask that you not return to Las Vegas."

"I'm being banned from Vegas?" Eric's eyes flicked back and forth between the two people standing in front of him.

"It's either that or jail time." Iverson ground out.

"I'm good with that." Eric quickly nodded. The captain stepped forward and unlocked his handcuffs. The woman waved for him to follow her. They travelled to the desk where he picked up his laptop and the rest of his possessions that his 'friends' had dropped off at the precinct. Turns out they weren't that interested in associating with him after he'd been arrested. They walked out into the sunshine, where Eric immediately halted.

"I know you just hired me, but I don't know anything – what do I call you? Where will I be working? When do I start?"

She turned and faced him. "You can call me Hetty. The office is in LA and you can start now. After you change into proper attire, of course."

"All I own is shorts and flip flops." He shrugged.

Hetty frowned. "We'll work on that."


	3. Nell

**A Smattering of Stories**

**Disclaimer:** Don't own the characters or the show.  
**A/N:** Thanks to ncisnewbie, blue dogs rock, TMVH50, Guest M, shestarsky, and BH72 for the reviews! And no, Hetty has yet to discover an antidote to Eric's pants allergy.

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**Nell**

_Prompt: 'How Nell and her sister set up her internet dating profile'_

"Linda Mae Jones. What. Are. You. Doing." Nell ground the words out once she saw what her sister had unsuccessfully tried to hide on her computer screen.

"I have a plan." Linda, although slightly taller than her slightly older sister, shrunk back at the disapproval in her voice.

Nell snorted. "Every time you utter those words disaster soon follows."

"That's not fair" Linda grumbled, "not _always_."

Nell began to tick reasons off on her fingers. "There was that time I had a black eye for my school picture. And when we had to buy Mom all new bowls. Not to mention the summer spent scooping poop off the lawn."

"First, you agreed to play back catcher, second, I would have been fine juggling if Dad hadn't scared me, and you loved that goat that I won!"

Nell's eyes narrowed. "I bet you didn't think Paul would tell me that he's now trying to grow his brows back."

A sigh emerged from deep within Linda. "It was _his_ idea to build a demolition derby car. I was just helping."

The two sisters stared at each other, stuck in a stalemate. This was just what Nell feared when Linda had showed up on her doorstep with a bag in one hand and a box of Mom's muffins in the other. She knew her family worried about her being out in LA by herself, but this was the first time one of them had made the trek out unannounced to check on her. She suspected Paul, her brother, had masterminded the trip to give their hometown some peace from the mayhem that seemed to follow Linda. Nell watched as her sister narrowed her eyes and started to pout. Unfortunately Nell was well acquainted with that look – it signaled Linda's unwillingness to deviate from her plan. Best to get on board instead of being swept away by the ensuing storm.

"Why don't you just tell me what you're doing?"

Linda's pout began to transform into a small smile. "Making you a dating profile."

"And you decided to do this because?" Nell was already forming her own plan to make sure the page was never seen by anyone after Linda finished making it.

"You're out here all alone, what if you need a date for a work function?" Linda frowned again, "Unless you're sure that an office romance is out of the question."

Nell felt the heat move up her neck and she willed it to go back down. "No, company policy."

"What about people you meet while working?"

"I've told you, the network has me working on true crime stories. The only people I meet are either victims or criminals, neither of which are preferable as a date." She had told her family she worked at a TV network which explained her ability to be very up-to-date on the latest stories.

Linda tapped her chin with a finger, "I don't know, it would be helpful if you were ever locked out of your car. You could get one of them to pop the door open for you."

Nell squeezed her eyes shut. "You are not going to teach yourself how to break into a car."

Linda gave her best 'who me?' innocent face, but she failed to be convincing. Realizing that Nell wasn't buying her act, she changed the subject. "C'mon, this'll be fun. It's like building a whole different identity." She gasped, "It's like making an alias!" She buried her head in the keyboard, typing away in the various boxes.

A quick turn on her heel had Nell facing in the opposite direction. She started to run through the pros and cons of this situation. On the one hand it could be dangerous for her cover and Hetty might not be happy with this popping up on the internet. On the other, she missed the chaos that she and Linda used to cause. There was something special about landing up laying on the floor laughing while other people just rolled their eyes.

"Okay. Let's do it." She spun back around and gave her sister a big smile.

Linda matched her smile. "Great!" She fished around in her bag. "One rule though, every time you say 'this is a bad idea' or something like it, you have to take a shot." She clunked a bottle of Scotch on the table beside the computer.

"Isn't this the brand Dad drinks?"

Linda nodded, "He asked me to pick up a bottle to bring home. Something about him not wanting a trinket for a souvenir."

"Are you planning to buy another unopened one for him?" Nell's eyes widened when Linda shook her head. "That's not a good plan, he won't like that it's not full."

A quick twist popped the cap off. "Drink! And, it'll be just like when we were younger and slipped drinks out of the liquor cabinet."

Nell's shoulders dropped and she marched into the kitchen to get a glass. She had to watch what she said or Linda would get her completely drunk and then she wouldn't be able to watch what was put on the profile. She trudged back with the glass and watched as Linda poured the first shot. She saluted her sister with the drink and downed it in one quick glug. She coughed slightly, "Why does he drink this stuff? It burns!"

Linda laughed. "Let's get started." She closed her eyes and waggled the mouse around. "Let's start…here!" She clicked in a box. "Interests."

Nell started ticking some off on her fingers. "Monster trucks, rock & roll, and demolition derbies."

"That's a terrible idea, we're trying to get you a date!" Linda looked slightly horrified.

"A-HA!" Nell grabbed the bottle and poured a shot. "You said it was a bad idea, drink up."

Linda made a face, but she paid her dues and threw the shot back. "Where did those come from?"

Nell hitched a shoulder up. "If we're going to make a different persona, let's go all the way. My friend and I went to a monster truck rally together and I'd go again."

"Note to self, report back that Nell has made friends and is having new experiences."

"I knew it! You were sent here to check up on me!" Nell dropped her jaw, aghast that her sister would let that slip.

Linda gave a small smile. "We worry about you being out here by yourself. Well, when they're not worried about whatever insane scheme they think I'll pull next."

Nell pulled her sister into a hug. "I love hearing about your stunts, they make me miss home." She squeezed a bit tighter, "but I also love my job."

"We know that. Which is why we've stopped bothering you about moving back home." Linda squeezed back. "But it wouldn't hurt for you to visit, y'know, explain to the rest of them how my ideas are good for your health."

Nell busted out a laugh. "I'm not lying to them. You've shortened all of our lives." They sat back in their chairs and Linda pulled the laptop closer.

"Let's do this."

In the end, Nell stopped worrying about hiding the profile or trying to rein in her sister because after they were done with hers, they went on a journey through many others. They giggled until their sides hurt as they scrolled through the website's matches for Nell. The next morning Linda set off on her journey back home with a glowing report of how Nell was doing in LA and a part-bottle of Scotch for their dad.


End file.
